Free Energy Pioneer- John Worrell Keely

by Theo Paijmans

  The outcome of the meeting was that, of the 60 stockholders present, who held proxies for about 150 others, all were in favor of Keely. One dissenting vote though was heard when the reorganization was proposed. The proposition was to decrease the value of the shares from $50 to $20, but to increase the number of the shares to $250,000, so that the capital would remain the same.48

  The incident also demonstrated that, as the previous years had witnessed, the Keely Motor Company had never been a unanimous organization. Some of its members were driven by the simple prospect of profit, and profit alone; but those who did so would become greatly disappointed over the years. Others felt more favorably of Keely and perhaps shared the same sense of wonder with him. A clear indication revealed itself at a meeting held three days after the meeting on September 8. Collier, Thomas and William Clark resigned from their positions as directors of the Keely Motor Company. In their place Boekel, New Yorker George Hastings and Henry N. Hooper of Brooklyn were appointed. New Yorker Guilian S. Hook was elected Treasurer.

  Thomas vented his frustration of the whole affair in a long tirade: "We withdrew as a body... because the suit brought against Mr. Keely by the Board of Directors of the Keely Motor Company" — here Mr. Thomas spoke very sarcastically — "was brought by the New York directors without in any way giving the Philadelphia directors any intimation whatever of what they were going to do. They did not do it in the board, but acted as a board themselves without any authority from us. They not only acted without our previous knowledge in the matter, but as a Board of Directors of the Keely Motor Company they appropriated themselves money to push the suit. To get the money... they sold the stock of the company at a great sacrifice. Of this I am certain. It was roughshod all through. We had no say in running the machine at all and were treated disgracefully. They ignored our Treasurer to such an extent that he resigned. Whenever they had any money to pay they would pay it themselves, and would not allow it to come within 50 years of our Treasurer's hands. ...After we discovered that the suit had been brought we canvassed the matter thoroughly and withdrew... .I see by the election that the New York directors gain practically two members and a Treasurer, leaving only one Philadelphian. Well, they are stronger now than they were before."49

  When on September 25 the new Board of Directors met at the office of the Keely Motor Company at 911 Walnut Street, it was expected that the Board would take action upon the decision of the stockholders at their meeting of September 8 to reorganize and thus increase capital stock to "provide funds for the working out of the inventor's alleged new discovery."

  But that was by far not the most important matter to discuss, for Wilson's bill of January 3 had reached alarming proportions and the court proceedings of Wilson against Keely took a large share of the meeting. The directors also stated that "it had been decided to investigate 'a point' in the matter which, it is believed, will place everything right between Keely and the directors." This precise point was not explained. Boekel, who knew more about Keely's devices than any other man, gave the directors "a description of several interesting experiments recently made by Keely on his new 'sympathetic attraction.'"

  Keely stayed confident. The machine that Wilson claimed he had the rights to, and the machine that Keely was working on were "entirely different." Keely informed the experts that he would be ready to show them his machine and explain its working, according to the decree of the court. The decree did not demand that Keely would "put the machine to work."50

  Wilson's case against Keely was brought to the Court of Common Pleas, and the committee of experts which was appointed to investigate the matter was, from Keely's side, an unfortunate assembly. One of the appointed was Professor William D. Marks, who already had his dealings with Keely,51 and could hardly have been called impartial. Answering to a reporter on Collier's threat to have him arrested on a criminal charge and bring civil suit against him, he said, "Let me give you my statement of the affair. ...I think it was in 1878 that Mr. Collier approached me as secretary of the company and requested me to make an investigation of the Keely Motor. ...In the course of my investigation, after I made three visits to the shop of Mr. Keely, during which time I carefully watched all of his manipulations, I became convinced that the source of his alleged power was compressed air, located in a cylinder, which he called an 'expulsion tube.' I told Mr. Keely that I believed compressed air was concealed in the tube and asked to be allowed to take a monkey-wrench and unscrew a stop-cock in this tube, which would at once prove the correctness or incorrectness of my belief. I was refused both by Mr. Keely and Mr. Collier, under the absurd plea that it would 'desensitize' the machine. I then asked that they allow me to test a gauge on which there was an alleged pressure of 50,000 pounds. I was refused this opportunity also, on the ground that Mr. Keely desired to use this gauge on the following day. I asked this because I believed the gauge to have been tampered with. Then I said to Mr. Keely and Mr. Collier that both their machine and themselves were a swindle and a fraud."

  Apparently Marks only joined the committee "at the request of Dr. Pepper," provost of the University of Pennsylvania, and in reply "to a very courteous note from Judge Reed."

  Marks complained that the task was not easy: "Since this investigation has begun the committee has been shown a wreck which is apparently what is left of what Mr. Keely claimed to be the motor of 1878, and also a copper globe which has since been added. ...Messrs. Keely and Collier have refused to put together the machinery; to show its method of operation, or to furnish any explanation. ...A typewritten copy of this alleged explanation, which is not any explanation, has been furnished to the committee. It is still my opinion that the Keely motor is a fraud, Mr. Keely a swindler and possibly also Mr. Collier."

  Naturally Charles M. Cresson, who also was one of the experts appointed by the Court, and who also had dealings with Keely in the past as the chemist who analyzed his vaporic substance,52 said that the charge that the committee was hostile towards Keely was not true: "I was chairman of that committee, and I told them that we were not to inquire into the merits or demerits of this affair. We were simply to find out whether two machines were alike. If so, then Wilson's claim was good; if not, his claim was not good." Was Cresson impartial? It was Cresson who claimed to have been present during the past fifteen years at several exhibitions of the Keely Motor and who had said a week before to a reporter that it was his opinion that "No exhibit shown to me has to my mind demonstrated the fact that any of the work performed (such as the lifting of a heavy weight, exerting an enormous pressure per square inch, or running a rotary or other engine, or projecting bullets from a gun) is of necessity the result of any unknown or mysterious new force."53

  Naturally Judge Finletter, who presided over the case, denied allegations that he had remarked at a dinner party that Keely was a fraud and should be put in prison.54 These were however, the ingredients for Keely's trial.

  On November 17 at 10:00 a.m., the Court of Common Pleas was called to order. Rufus E. Shapley, Wilson's lawyer, addressed Judge Finletter and applied for a writ of attachment compelling Keely to appear in court at once. Finletter granted the request and an hour later. With the attachment, Deputy Sheriff Pattison headed for Keely's house and workshop. Keely was not in his house or his workshop, but in the vicinity of the Court House. Pattison searched the surroundings of the Court House, but could not find him. At 1:00 p.m. Keely was still not found, and Finletter adjourned court until half an hour later. Ten minutes before the court was again called to order, Keely walked in, appearing "to be laboring under suppressed excitement but walking erect." He was accompanied by his lawyer, Joseph J. Murphy. The two quietly took their seats, and at 1:30 p.m. Finletter called the court to order. Murphy told Finletter that Keely would like to defend himself, which he would do with a written statement. Keely then arose, took off his overcoat and kissed the book. Meanwhile Finletter told Keely that "You have been brought into court on an attachment for contempt in not obeying an order of the court.
You have now an opportunity to purge yourself of the contempt." Keely answered that he had done everything that had lain in his power to obey the court. He then read a long statement, "which he declared was true in every particular, giving an account of his interviews with the experts, who, he said, were hostile to him and unable through prejudice to make a fair report regarding the motor."

  After he finished, Finletter showed neither sympathy nor interest but instead, without for a moment considering or commenting upon Keely's statement, recited "in a low tone his decree, which he prepared during the reading of the statement. Finletter ordered that Keely 'shall be committed to the county prison to be kept there and confined in custody until he shall have purged himself of said contempt and until he shall have been legally discharged from said contempt.'" All the while Keely was standing in front of the Judge, "and listened attentively, his face bearing a look of suspense and anxiety." After Finletter was through, Keely "appeared to be dazed" and remained standing until Murphy asked him to sit down. Murphy immediately sent word to Wayne MacVeagh, Keely's senior lawyer.

  Keely left the courtroom in the custody of Pattison, and they went to the county prison. Keely and Patison crossed Independence Square, "followed by a dozen pairs of eyes," with Keely leading the way, and Pattison in the rear. The two walked out Samson Street to Ninth, where they got a carriage and were driven to the prison.55

  Notwithstanding Keely's typewritten explanation that he had given the committee, they too labeled his attitude as one of refusal; and it had been this refusal to disclose the exact nature of his discovery and to give information to the appointed committee that led Finletter to decide to imprison Keely for contempt of court. Cresson explained what that meant: "The commission was directed by the Court to ascertain such facts as would determine the similarity or dissimilarity of the machine and without any reference to their originality, economy or merit. The commission had no desire and has not made the slightest attempt to go beyond the narrow line of the duty imposed upon them by the Court. Four out of the five members which composed the commission reported simply the facts, which, briefly stated, were that Mr. Keely had not made it possible for them to do what they were directed to do, because he has not exhibited (except in dismantled condition) or operated the machine called the 'Keely Motor,' has not given them any intelligent description of it, and that he had obstructed rather than assisted them in their efforts to discharge the duty assigned them. They have done nothing to provoke or justify Mr. Collier's abuse."

  Thus Keely was locked in a felon's cell in Moyamensing Prison.56 The carpetless cell was 9 feet wide and 14 feet long. Prisoner # 150, he was locked up and left to look "gloomily through the small cell window out upon that gray November day."57

  He spent a "quiet Sunday" in Moyamensing Prison, and although the night was cold, he said that "he slept as comfortably as he could expect under the circumstances." When breakfast was brought in, Keely's cell was skipped, for he would have a "heavier breakfast" half an hour later. A reporter wrote how Keely "sat near the door and listened with deep interest" to a sermon during a religious service, and "While the inventor was trying to fill out his afternoon nap up in his cell, a number of persons were making anxious inquiries. ...A few friends turned away when they were told that nobody could get into the prison on Sunday."58

  In the meantime, it was declared that the Court's commitment left Keely "to fix his own terms of imprisonment," meaning that he should remain committed "until he purges himself of contempt by complying with its order to explain his motor."59 November 19 would find Collier, Murphy and MacVeagh in Harrisburg, where they were making applications to the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania for his release,60 since "a very dexterous legal move had emanated from the brain of MacVeagh."61 Keely's lawyers secured a writ of habeas corpus from the Supreme Court, and he was released on a $1,000 bail.62

  A fortunate side-effect of Wilson's legal proceedings against Keely was that with this Keely was able to successfully defend himself against allegations of swindle, printed in a Philadelphia newspaper in January 1889. It was alleged that Keely at another time and place had been known as John Adam Huss, who had been involved in what appears to have been an elaborate swindle. Now, with Wilson's suit against him, he was able to prove that he was not.

  Two months after his release, on January 28, 1889,63 Chief Justice Paxton of the Supreme Court, upon hearing the case, reversed the decision of the Court of Common Pleas, and discharged Keely from the contempt of which he was adjudged guilty by Judge Finletter. The opinion of the Supreme Court was that "the order commanding Keely to exhibit, explain and operate his motor was premature, and that being the case the Court below had no right to enforce the attachment committing the defendant to jail for contempt."64

  The methods of the committee, and even its installment, were also considered highly dubious: "After issue was joined an examiner could have been appointed and the proofs taken in an orderly manner. Instead of so proceeding a commission of experts was appointed to examine the defendant's machine." Keely was not only required to exhibit his device, but also to operate it and explain the mode of construction and operation, a measure considered to require "considerable expense to clean the machine, put it together and operate it."65

  Even though Keely's attitude was labeled as one of refusal, the Supreme Court thought otherwise: "The defendant appears to have been willing to exhibit it and in point of fact did so. ... But to make an order not only to exhibit it but to operate it, the practical effect of which was to wring from him his defense in advance of any issue joined, was an improvident and excessive exercise of chancery powers. It is the more remarkable from the fact that the plaintiffs case, as shown by the exhibits and the drawings, was sealed up in an envelope and retained by the Court, access to the same being not only denied to the defendant, but even to the experts appointed by the Court."66

  Court of Common Pleas Judges Finletter, Gordon and Read grudgingly said that the Supreme Court was "laboring under a misconception when they reversed the decision of the lower court in releasing inventor Keely from prison."67 And so while the legal battle was over, and further legal details, pro and con, had become quite arcane, a newspaper concluded that "The right of imprisonment for contempt of Court is, and always will be, accepted; but when a vulnerable point can be found in the judicial mail, it will always be pierced to discharge the prisoner. The Judges don't just state it in that way, but that's about the way, all the same."68

  It would be a year later, on February 25, 1890, that poor Wilson would finally give up. Again his patience seemed exhausted when his fortune was exhausted. Keely's release "practically ended all litigation," a friend of Wilson said, "there was no way of getting the evidence in, and without it the case had to end. Mr. Wilson is not a wealthy man and he could not afford to begin a new litigation. It was proposed some time ago to clear the records by making the suit disconnected, but Mr. Wilson hesitated to do that until yesterday, when he had his counsel discontinue the case."69

  Keely's release was wryly noted in the press: "Just as the sympathetic world was beginning to despair of ever hearing from him more, Keely, the motor man, bobs up again as new and fresh as when he first came to the surface, and assures us that his mysterious force is really bottled at last and that he is going to let some loose in a few days. Some wicked people will doubt of course and say they were told this before."70

  After his release, and during the winter of 1888-1889, Keely was turning his attention more and more to a series of experiments of a different nature. Perhaps his former experiments were done with a more or less commercial prospect in mind, but now he was fully concentrating himself upon the unknown force and its laws of which he still was ignorant. He admitted "that he cannot construct a patentable engine to use this force till he has mastered the principle."71

  Nevertheless, and undoubtedly under pressure from the Keely Motor Company, he demonstrated a preliminary commercial engine in November 1889: "before he had completed his graduatio
n, he was induced... to apply a brake, to show what resistance the vibratory current could bear under powerful friction. A force sufficient to stop a train of cars, it was estimated, did not interfere with its running; but under additional strain a 'thud' was heard, and the shaft of the engine was twisted."72

  In 1890, Keely was still amidst an astonishing range of new experiments based upon levitation. While its results are similar to those of antigravity, levitation is looked upon as the suspension or neutralizing of gravity, while antigravity is considered a force opposite of gravity. Although Keely had experimented with the suspension of gravity years before and built devices to do so, he was now turning his attention more and more to the navigation of the skies. This remarkable evolution in his ambitions was not that unusual. For years his experiments were limited to the production of his force, the raising of a lever, the firing of his vaporic gun and the demonstration of a vacuum greater than had ever been produced. Since 1887, he had been working on what a newspaper referred to as "a flying machine." A year later he pursued his research on a line that enabled him to show a certain progress year after year. This also meant that he never repeated his experiments. While discarding or improving upon his research equipment after having obtained the results that his theories would lead him to expect, he continued his investigations with the information thus obtained in ever-new directions;73 his thoughts traveling along the same lines.

  On April 6, Professor Leidy of the University of Pennsylvania witnessed certain levitation experiments. Leidy was greatly impressed, and declared to a reporter that he was convinced that Keely had discovered "a new force, distinct from magnetism or electricity."74

  Another experiment that Leidy witnessed, and that resembled Keely's demonstration in 1886, was the application of the force through the atmosphere from one room to another "without any other medium of conveyance than a silk cord. The door into a little back shop, whose existence until then was unknown, was now open and a silk cord passed from the transmitter to a large bronze globe, which was mounted on an axis horizontally. The other end of the cord was not fastened to the globe, but to a slender bar of steel supported on an upright near it. A plate of glass an inch thick was between the end of the resonant steel bar and the globe. A similar piece of glass was put between the wall and the other end of the bar. Glass was put under the upright which supported the bar. Glass plates were also put under the upright which supported the axis of the globe. Keely then took a harmonica in his hands, and, allowing the silk cord from the transmitter to pass over the harmonica in contact with it, began to sound notes on it. When the sympathetic chord was struck the vibratory force, he declared, was conveyed along the silk cord. The bronze globe, which was about fourteen inches in diameter, began to revolve about its axis. The faster Keely played, the faster the globe whirled."